The National Health and Medical Research Council says Australia is already seeing saerious health effects from climatic changes associated with global warming.
Epidemics associated with warmer, wetter weather had hit the Northern Territory first but were likely to spread across Australia, the Federal medical body warned.
There are already indications of increasing incidence of diseases such as Ross River virus in WA.
"What we're facing is probably the biggest health catastrophe the human race has faced." Dr. Tony Adams, Chairman of the NHMRC's public health committee said yesterday.
Infectious diseases which had swept across Northern Australia in the past six months had been brought on by one of the wettest rainy seasons that region had experienced. Dr Adams said. "these may be early signs of the Australian situation - signs that things may be going wrong" he told a meeting of the NHMRC.
Dr. Aillen Plant, chief medical officer of the NT Department of Health and Communications, said the NT had suffered four major infectiouis diseases epidemics brought on by "the wettest wet we've had in years".
Naegleria Fowleri, a usually rare organism known to cause amoebic meningitis was found in a Darwin sam used for water skiing. The dam had to be closed to prevent an outbreak of meningitis.
The NHMRC has just released a report into the health effects of climatic change brought on by global warming.
The study, by researchers from the Department of Public Health and Nutrition and the Department of Geography at Wollongong University, predicted that all the problems seen in the NT would become widespread as the earth warms.
In Perth, WA Environmental Protection Authority cjairman Barry Carbon said there was no doubt that the climate was changing.
Those who claimed it was not were wrong.
Mr. Carbon said Ross River Virus was a tropical diseasae that was not found in the South of WA 10 years ago.
Now it had travelled down from the north-west and occured as far south as Bunbury.
Athsma was another serious medical problem that was becoming more prevalent right across Australia.
Mr. Carbon said Naegleria Fowleri lived in soil but was killed by chlorine in drinking water supplies.
In most cases it reaches the brain by passing through a membrane above the nasal passages after water goes up a swimmer's nose.
The NHMRC said earlier this year that the secondary effects of global climate change may be far more devestating than better known threats like rising sea levels.
The council warned that most of Australia would very probably experience some environmental change as a result of long-term climate changes and some were already occurring.
"It seems highly likely that these changes will create health problems and it is vital that planning be undertaken now to address these problems."it said.
The first signs of trouble in the NT appeared when people in Darwin began to develop meliodosis, a rare disease caused by an organism that lives in the soil. The heavy rain made the underground water table rise, bringing the meliodosis organisms to the surface.
Dr. Plant said the heavy rains and the need to stay indoors brought on an outbreak of gastroenteritus which "just rolled on for months".
For you who don't know, WA is Western Australia, NT is the Northern Territory.
Ross River virus is a mosquito-borne virus that causes severe muscular / nervous system effects including long-term (years) paralysis in some cases. I have some doubts as to Mr Carbon's statements about the spread south being a result of global warming, s ince the disease only entered WA from the NT about thirty years ago, and has been spreading steadily down the coast. My understanding is that it originally entered the NT fron northern Queensland.
The issue is serious, however, since one of the primary effects of global warming will be to change habitats, and therefore species distribution. This is likely to have all sorts of ramifications for our species, and is liable to be devestating to species that are currently under pressure, particularly those on "biological islands", remnant areas of native bush, or unique environments surrounded by physical barriers.
The issue of changing distribution of disease is also a major one, since many disease organisms thrive under hotter conditions. Of interest, but not mentioned are the dinoflagellate algae, many species of which are toxic, and some of which cause severe sensory and behavioral effects. These are important given the fact that Australia is a predominately coastal culture, and several new toxic algae have recently been introduced, apparently in bilgewater of freighters, and as an unintentional part of the "first fleet" reenactment. There is one dinoflagellate in particular, found currently off Darwin and in other NT waters, which has the effect of permanently reversing the normal perception of hot and cold. People ingest them when eating fish and shellfish. Other species cause different effects, and we can expect that their range will start to extend southwards. With increased UV light, we can also expect a far higher rate of mutation in both algae and bacteria.
